Clone Trooper of the Republic
by Kudzu1
Summary: Mere hours have passed since the Battle of Geonosis ended, and as the assault ships hang in orbit above the ringed world, the clone trooper philosophy is given review.


Clone Trooper of the Republic  
By Kudzu

_"E Pluribus Unum - Out of Many, One"  
_Charles Thomson

It was a bleak world, Geonosis. Rust-red ground and dusty skies, with black, white, gray, orange, red, and blue lighting the air, for on that day, the Clone Wars had begun on this forgotten world in the Outer Rim.

And the Republic was now at war.

And the clone trooper was a soldier of the Republic.

He was more than _a _soldier of the Republic - he was _the_ soldier of the Republic, for he was identical to over a million other clone infantry units comprising the Grand Army of the Republic. Were they any different?

Maybe they were. And maybe nobody but them would ever see it.

The _Acclamator_-class assault ship _Ossus_ soared over Geonosis in silence, its orbit drawing higher and higher. Smoke clouds billowed from the deserted battlefield, visible even from space and even hours after the last shot had been fired. Geonosis was a tired and defeated world.

Victory for the Republic - or was it, if so many of their Jedi Generals had died?

It was victory, certainly, but at a heavy cost.

Would the clone trooper have given pause to the notion that a battlefield from which their enemy had fled was not a field of victory if the heavy casualties were of the ranks of the clones? Two hundred Jedi had come to Geonosis, and barely more than twenty had departed it. If the one hundred thousand clone troopers sent into battle on this planet had been reduced to ten thousand, would it have been anything _but_ victory?

And if it was not a full victory, was it because so many people had died, or because so many military assets had been destroyed?

After all, clone troopers were military assets more than they were people. This was the duty for which they were bred, and this was the duty that they would be glad to carry out.

Military assets, not people.

No middle hyperlane.

The clone trooper watched the disc of Geonosis shrinking ever-so-slowly beneath him. The booted feet of his brothers clanked by behind him. The air still smelled of the ozone that was byproduct of blaster discharges, and of the sweat of sixteen thousand clone troopers on this transport ship.

In short, the smells that all clone troopers had become accustomed to from their training on Kamino.

For this was what they were created for the purpose of doing. They fought and therefore they were. From a very young age, they were in danger of being culled as "deviant" or "dysfunctional" clones if their performance was not up to par with that of their brothers. And in a way, the victims of this artificial selection were unable to complain.

With their deaths, they served the Republic by eliminating themselves from their army so that the clones who performed better than them could take their place. And to serve the Republic was the greatest desire of every clone trooper in the GAR.

Clones and droids. Droids and clones. It was a favorite claim of the Kaminoans that clones were much more effective than droids because they were alive and could think independently, learning and growing and adapting. It was true, to an extent.

But the Kaminoans did not encourage or foster independent thought or growth. Deviant clones were put down early in life. A clone who thought "too much" was a liability. All that was needed of them was their total loyalty and commitment to fighting for the Republic even unto death. Complete obedience, unswerving.

Created to fight, not to think.

So the Kaminoans' claims were technically true, but due to how they themselves operated, they were a lie. The idea of independence may have appealed to General Kenobi when he arrived on Kamino, but Jedi were said to greatly value life and to hold it in great esteem.

The Kaminoans valued life as their own possession, life as theirs to create and to destroy.

To play at being a god, when no gods truly existed.

The Kaminoans presumed to fill the void.

He was a clone trooper, created to fight, to serve, and to die in the service of the Galactic Republic. One of a disposable army that would soon grow to number in the millions, now sent to fight in a series of planetary wars that would be named after them. The Clone Wars. Droids had fought in wars before, long before the Battle of Ruusan that ended one era to begin another.

The Battle of Geonosis, that ended one era to begin another.

Out were the days of peace for which clone troopers had never been intended to live through, and in were the days of war for which they were bred.

In that sense, the clone trooper wanted to see war more than anything else, for if he was of no use to his Republic, he might as well have been dead. His own life was nothing. He was like a cell in some greater organism, and even if he died, he would be replaced and that organism would live on.

He was determined to stand strong in the Republic's defense for as long as he could, and this was all that he knew of pride. It was pride in service, not pride in himself. Pride in knowing that the Republic was stronger because of him, just as it was stronger because of any one of his brothers. Together, they were strong. Alone, they were meaningless.

He had seen his brothers fall and die on this day, watched them bleed their lives away through ruptured armor, looked on as they took blaster bolts in the chest and died almost at once, observed as missiles and laser cannons took fully loaded gunships straight out of the air and as they spiraled down into the desolate landscape. They would never be mourned.

They were there to destroy the Republic's enemies until battle saw their end come and until fate dealt them that inevitable deathblow. Death came to all, and one could only delay the inevitable.

The longer a clone trooper lived, the longer he could serve the Republic and the longer he had to gun down the mindless battle droids and other forces of the Confederacy that opposed it. But he could also serve with his death.

He could serve his brothers, his commanders, and his Republic with either life or death, and sacrifice was nothing but the deepest of service. The deepest of service that was expected of the clone troopers, by the Kaminoans, by the Republic, and by themselves…and so self-sacrifice, where necessary, was just a natural extension of this.

They fought so that people who could live a full and peaceful life would not have to. They were brought into this galaxy to bring victory to the Republic in whatever way that they could, and in this, they were unique. A man on Alderaan was born to enjoy life and to carry on his family. One day, he would marry and have children, and so life on Alderaan went on.

A clone on Kamino was born to serve the Galactic Republic in peace and in war; to defend its citizens from harm; to uphold its principles against defilement; to obey its leaders and his commanders; to lead the armies of the Galactic Republic into battle. Not to enjoy life for what it could be for them, but to live life for what it could be to the Republic.

At Geonosis, the Republic saw it for the first time. Without care for themselves, the ranks of the clone troopers attacked head-on, fighting to destroy these droids that threatened the people of the Republic. If the Confederacy won on this day, the GAR would have failed, and failure was never an option. They fought and won, even as their own dead lay sprawled across the hard ground of Geonosis. Those fallen had given their all for the Republic that they all had sworn their undying allegiance to, and now it was the still-living's turn.

_Train for triumph_, they used to say. Their death did not mean defeat. It was one unit eliminated. The Republic stood high above all their needs. Their needs were merely food, water, breathable atmosphere, and a weapon to destroy the Republic's enemies with. They had no need for creature comforts, as nice as they were. Creature comforts didn't keep them able to fight, nor did they prevent them from death. Life was for the Republic, not just for them.

They were unimportant as individual beings, and their only purpose was to serve.

This was what it was to be a clone trooper of the Republic.


End file.
